


Weltschmerz

by cobweb_diamond



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon, M/M, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-03
Updated: 2011-01-03
Packaged: 2017-10-14 09:27:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/147812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cobweb_diamond/pseuds/cobweb_diamond
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How to come to terms with the unsatisfactory nature of physical reality.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Weltschmerz

**1.**  
Forgers are rare enough that in his entire career to date, Arthur has only ever met two. In retrospect, he is very glad that his first experience of working with one had not been with Eames.

Elise is very good at what she does. A quiet and watchful woman, she somehow transforms herself into a boisterous old man as soon as they go under. Arthur is fascinated.

‘How does it work?’ he asks, once they’re out and safe. ‘Is it like architecture, when you memorise the layout beforehand?’

There must be a trick to it, otherwise everyone would be doing it.

Elise takes a thoughtful drag on her cigarette. ‘Observation's important, of course. You’ve got to know who you’re imitating, inside and out. But you, Arthur, you could probably run more in-depth background checks than I ever manage.’

Arthur inclines his head, acknowledging the accuracy of the compliment.

‘It’s mainly because of the way _I_ am,’ she continues, clearly enjoying the chance to bestow her wisdom on someone. ‘Forgive me, but a lot of people could do your job, if not to the same standard. But one must have a particularly malleable sense of self-image to be able to forge another person all the way.’

‘I’ve tried it,’ Arthur admits. Of course he has. When he was younger, he’d played around with making the obvious changes, but he'd never managed to get it to stick. He'll never have the real-life experience necessary to successfully replicate what it’s like to have been born with a Y chromosome. ‘Just little things, but they didn’t come across... right.’

‘Everyone tries. But you have to be able to fool yourself into believing what you’re trying to be is real. I guess my capacity for self-delusion is my strength.’ She blows a cloud of smoke out into the night. ‘You must have a very solid sense of self-image, Arthur.’

 **2.**  
Eames isn’t introduced to him as a forger. He’s been making a decent reputation as an extractor when Arthur first decides to contact him. More importantly, according to all sources he exhibits no signs of being either a psycho or overly greedy when it comes to the payout, two character traits Arthur has sworn off working with following his most recent disastrous partnership.

Within an hour of meeting him, Arthur is torn between abandoning the job entirely, and asking Eames to partner up with him long-term. The man has a near-superhuman ability to work out what the mark is thinking just from what scant pre-background-check information Arthur had managed to drag together in the airport check-in lounge that morning. He also appears to have a photographic memory for faces.

In addition to these annoyingly impressive skills, he’s incredibly smug. Like, “I just won the lottery and fucked your mom,” smug. He lounges on one of the enormous, ugly chairs in the hotel room he’d picked out for their first meeting, chewing on a toothpick and looking Arthur up and down like he’s considering making the request that a casting-couch scene be part of their business arrangement. At one point he illustrates part of his commentary on the mark with a quote from Goethe. The only reason Arthur even _knows_ it was Goethe is because Eames caught his baffled look and explained it to him. Condescendingly, and while still chewing on that fucking toothpick.

The worst part of it is that Eames is disgustingly attractive, and knows it. He dresses like a colourblind middle-aged Englishman from some time in the mid-20th century, he never shaves, and somehow he’s still _really fucking hot._ It’s the story of Arthur’s life that when he finally meets someone who has every attribute that he finds attractive in a man -- tattoos, good arms, not too tall, ability to kick someone’s ass and leave it kicked, appreciation of sarcasm -- it turns out to be _Eames._ Eames, who wears maroon socks, can speak at least three languages but appears to use two of them only to make sexual puns, and who has already developed a habit of drawling Arthur’s name into his ear when he’s trying to concentrate on his laptop, making all the hair on the back of Arthur’s neck stand on end.

It’s really fucking annoying.

*      *      *

Eames has an SAS tattoo on his left bicep. Arthur wouldn’t trust his word in a million years on something like that if he’d mentioned it out loud, but for some reason Arthur’s certain the tattoo is for real.

*       *      *

  
The mark’s childhood home is small enough that they feel it’s worth the risk to use it. Or at least, Eames feels it’s worth the risk and Arthur, after several hours of debate, finally agrees to give it a try.

The general store/cafe by the mark’s house is manned by a teenage boy in a trucker hat. Arthur is waiting for Eames to show up for their practice walk-through, sipping from a cup of coffee and examining the labels of 1980s-era packaged food for authenticity when someone bumps into him. It’s a young woman in a strawberry-coloured sundress, hair falling loose out of her ponytail.

‘Oh my gosh, I am so sorry,’ says the projection, laughing and picking up the cereal boxes she’d knocked over, stacking them haphazardly back onto the shelf. ‘Did I spill that on you?’

‘Only a little,’ says Arthur, shaking his arm to rid it of excess coffee. He’s kind of amused that his own mind has cooked up this paragon of clear-skinned Midwest beauty to live in the practise dream. She looks like the love-interest from some made-for-TV movie about a dairy farm.

‘Here, let me get you a new cup, it’s the least I can do,’ she says, and looks up at him through her eyelashes.

OK, this is kind of awkward. A figment of his imagination is hitting on him.

‘I’m afraid I’m waiting for someone,’ he says. ‘A guy,’ he adds, trying to inject enough apology into his tone that she won’t get offended. He’s not sure which he’d prefer: for Eames to show up now and witness this ridiculous scene and undoubtedly laugh at him, or for Eames _not_ to show up and thus leave Arthur stranded with a horny projection of his own subconscious.

‘Oh _really_?’ she says, voice changing. ‘So I guess I’m not your type after all?’

‘Uh, what?’ says Arthur, just in time to see the young woman’s features shift into the chiseled jaw and blond hair of a 1980s-era male model. Arthur experiences a moment of pure, unadulterated confusion before he works out what’s going on. ‘Eames? You’re a forger as well?’

‘And an Englishman, and a gentleman,’ Eames adds, his own voice and accent incongruously coming out of the unfamiliar mouth. ‘So, is this one more to your liking?’

‘No,’ says Arthur. ‘Stop screwing around.’

‘So what _is_ your type, dear Arthur? I’m all agog.’

‘Real,’ snaps Arthur. ‘My type is _real_.’

And that’s how Arthur finds out that Eames is a forger.

 **3.**  
After that first job with Eames is over, he doesn’t say “You do good work,” or “I’m rather impressed,” or any of the other compliments that come to mind. He doesn’t need to know Eames very well to know that he’d be an asshole about it, possibly forever. But Arthur’s still allowed to _think_ about how fascinating it was to watch Eames’ face slip into the expression and shape of someone else, smoother even than Elise had ever managed. He wonders how Eames manages to make it look so effortless when Arthur has little to no control over the way he presents when they’re dreaming. Eames has only ever been a man, so how the hell can he make such a convincing woman? He’d implied at one point that he’d seduced people in dreams before, as part of an extraction. How far had he gone? Surely, _surely_ there is no way he’s able to make himself into a convincing enough woman to fool someone _in bed_. Imitating someone’s facial expressions and body-language, sure. But not that.

So now there’s another emotion he can add to the confused selection of things that come to mind when he thinks about Eames: jealousy.

 **4.**  
Arthur would be tempted to call Cobb’s architecture effortless, had he not seen all the work that goes into it before they go under. They’ve worked together several times now, and Cobb appears to be precisely the type of person Arthur would like to partner with: reliable without being one of the military cast-offs, and with a well-thought-out personal code of ethics.

The extraction business, young as it is, is already changing. One-man jobs are few and far between due to the growing awareness of PASIV technology, and Arthur is self-aware enough to know that he will never get the same satisfaction from security work as he would from a well-executed mind heist. He and Cobb have been sounding each other out for some time now. Courting, you could almost call it.

‘Have you any idea how painful it is for me to design a whole scenario with _no_ buildings?’ Cobb says wryly.

Arthur flips through the various sketches of sand, sand and more sand, looping in and out of itself towards the horizon. ‘Think of it as a challenge.’

‘Oh, it’s challenging all right.’

They’re meeting in New York so Cobb can explain the new layout (desert, to mesh with the mark’s apprehension about being sent to Iraq) and Arthur can share his fresh research on the mark’s family background.

‘Can we add a water element?’ asks Arthur, picking up the fifth sketch of Cobb’s storyboard, two steps away from what should be the extraction point. ‘Is there a compound we can add to the IV to make him feel thirsty?’

‘Maybe. It’d be difficult to time correctly -- ‘ He breaks off, his phone ringing. ‘Just a minute.’

Arthur wanders off to the coffee machine, politely avoiding eavesdropping on Cobb’s call. When he returns, Cobb is saying, ‘Of course, of course,’ in the meaningless agreement of adult children trying to reassure their parents. ‘Right away.’ It’s the first time Arthur’s ever heard him sound anything less than suave and quietly confident.

When Cobb hangs up, his face goes grey, very suddenly, like he’d been concentrating on keeping his blood pumping just to finish the phone call. ‘It’s Mal,’ he says blankly. ‘She’s in labour. It’s too early.’

Well, that’s clear as mud. More information is required.

‘Who’s Mal?’

‘My wife,’ says Cobb.

Cobb doesn’t wear a ring, but it’s not shocking information or anything. ‘Where is she now?’ asks Arthur, going to his computer.

‘On the way to hospital.’

‘In what country?’ Arthur asks patiently.

Cobb seems to come awake. ‘Paris.’

‘Do you care about getting there legally?’

‘Do I look like I care?’ Cobb says sharply. ‘As long as I don’t get arrested on my way into the hospital.’

‘All right. I’m going to make a call. I’ve got someone with a private plane who owes me a favour.’

‘What can I do?’

‘Find the quickest way to get us to Memphis. That’s where the plane is.’

‘Shit, Arthur,’ says Cobb. Arthur thinks it’s the first time he’s heard Cobb swear, even including occasions when projections were shooting at them. ‘You mean business, don’t you?’

Arthur slants a smile at him over the laptop screen. ‘Always.’

He sees Cobb onto the plane and stays behind to make their apologies to the client, who is surprisingly understanding even though Arthur is too discreet to mention the reason why they’d pulled out of the job. A week later he gets a text from an unrecognised number, saying: “Mal OK, baby perfect, talk later. DC.”

To be honest, Arthur doesn’t expect to hear from him again after that, but Cobb is back within the year. When they next meet, Cobb is far warmer towards him than he’d ever been before. Not that he’d ever been cold – he and Arthur had developed a good rapport, Arthur likes to think – but he speaks to Arthur more like a friend.

‘I want to thank you for what you did when I heard about Mal,’ says Cobb. ‘Not everyone would’ve helped like that.’

Arthur doesn’t disagree.

‘Last year we were discussing making our partnership more official,’ Cobb continues. ‘Are you still interested?’

And that is that. Over dinner they hash out the details of what each of them will and will not do. Arthur is hesitant to go so far as to reveal the identities of his business contacts and previous clients, but Cobb seems accepting of his reticence.

‘We’ve worked together, what, five times already?’ asks Cobb rhetorically. ‘I’ve never noticed any trouble, but if we’re going to work together I have to know: is there anything in your subconscious that might interfere when we’re on the job?’

Arthur sips his wine, willing the tension out of his shoulders. ‘You sound like you’re speaking from experience.’

‘I worked with someone once who had a crippling phobia of cats. Sounds stupid, but when the job got tricky, his stress started manifesting itself all over the place in cat form. That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about.’ He smiles. ‘As for myself... Mal tends to pop up now and then, but she’s never caused any problems so far.’

Arthur nods. ‘I’d like to meet her sometime,’ he says, stalling. ‘She sounds like a fascinating woman.’ One of the things he’s learnt over the course of the evening is that like her husband, Mal is an architect. ‘There is one thing that may cause difficulties if I’m hosting the dream. I’ve not known it to interfere with a job yet, but these things are unpredictable. My physical appearance may change, on occasion,’ he says, breaking it to Cobb gently.

Cobb relaxes a little. ‘That’s pretty normal. Sometimes I have a beard because I grew one in grad school. And Mal assures me that I never get my own eye colour quite right.’

Arthur folds his hands on the table, annoyed at himself for still being so nervous about this even after years of practise. The best way to get it out is as factually and as quickly as possible. ‘It’s the reason behind the changes that’s the important thing. Any discrepancies in my appearance are generally to do with height, muscle mass and so on because I was born female, so in the physical world my body has gone through changes that most people wouldn’t have experienced. I’ve undergone various treatments, but sometimes my subconscious manifests itself as more or less masculine depending on... my mood, I suppose.’

Cobb is startled, but he hides it well. ‘Well, I... as long as it doesn’t interfere with extraction, I don’t see how that would be a problem. Uh, thank you for telling me, though.’

People often thank you for telling them. Arthur can never tell if they mean it or not. He suspects that it’s just something people say as filler while they’re furiously wondering about the current state of your genitals. Arthur is able to recognise the exact moment when Cobb’s brain starts ticking over the various late-night documentaries he’s seen about transsexuals, or newspaper articles maybe, and when he starts wondering just what parts of Arthur have been surgically altered or removed. Arthur knows that he’ll catch Cobb staring at him for a while, trying to work out what’s going on in there, but he’ll most likely get over it pretty quickly. Dom Cobb's a classy guy, and people in their line of work tend to be aggressively open-minded by nature.

Plus, Arthur is the best. Someone as practical-minded as Cobb isn’t going to turn that down just because Arthur’s testosterone is produced by an outside source.

 **5.**  
It’s the kind of off-hand joke you get in shitty sitcoms and Saturday Night Live. “The only guys I let that close to me are my doctor and my tailor!” _cue audience laughter_. It’s easy, old-fashioned humour, but the kind that persists. Ha ha ha, it’s pretty gross when a man has to get close to your dick, isn’t it?

But Arthur can relate. Lately the only guys he’s allowed that near to him _are_ his doctor and his tailor, but on the other hand, he doesn’t have a dick.

‘You want a wider leg on that, or what?’ asks Roberto.

Arthur inspects himself in the mirror. ‘You do good work,’ he says. It’s the truth. In his shirtsleeves you can just about tell if you’re looking for it, the fabric hanging a little too loose around Arthur’s too-narrow waist, but with the added bulk of a waistcoat no one is ever any the wiser. He goes to Roberto for two reasons: he wants to look sharp as fuck, and he never wants anyone to ever, ever look at him and think for even a moment that he might be anything less, or more, than he is.

‘Narrower? Wider?’ asks Roberto impatiently. He doesn’t have the best customer service in the world, but that isn’t so very important considering the many other things counting in his favour.

‘It’s excellent as is,’ says Arthur, shrugging off the jacket and placing it back on its hanger. ‘I’ll take it now, please.’

*      *     *

  
‘Looking sharp as ever, dear boy,’ says Eames, wafting past him with a fragrant thermos of coffee from the shop downstairs. Arthur can never get them to give him take-out; he doesn’t know how Eames manages it. ‘New suit?’

‘Arthur’s always wearing a new suit,’ says Cobb.

‘And it’s _much_ appreciated,’ Eames leers.

‘Not for your benefit, Mr Eames,’ says Arthur, digging his nails into his palm to stop himself from saying anything bitchier than that, and goes back to checking their flight details.

Introducing Eames and Cobb might have been a good move for his career, but it sure as hell hadn’t been a good move for his blood pressure.

  
 **6.**  
Following the Fischer job, Arthur goes on vacation for maybe a month before he gets bored and starts sending out feelers for another job. Because she’s clearly desperate for another chance to go under and also because she’s vanishingly unlikely to stab him in the back, he calls Ariadne to be his architect. Because she doesn’t know how these things work and seems to think they are some kind of a _team_ , she calls Eames.

‘How do you even have his number?’ asks Arthur, feeling perversely annoyed. Even _he_ doesn’t have Eames’ number.

‘We email,’ says Ariadne. ‘He’s a good guy. I think he enjoys having someone to talk to who isn’t, like, a wanted criminal or a potential employer.’

‘So he agreed to come because, what, you’re friends?’ This job is hardly going to be taxing, and Eames doesn’t need the money right now. He can’t possibly have spent all the proceeds from the Fischer job _already_.

Ariadne ducks her head, grinning. ‘Well, not exactly. But when I mentioned you’d be here, he suddenly seemed all for the idea. He said he’s been missing your happy shining face,’ she says innocently.

Yeah, that sounds like _exactly_ the kind of thing Eames would say.

*      *      *

  
Ariadne scrolls through Arthur’s surveillance pictures, frowning at what she sees. ‘Ugh, this job is so depressing.’

‘More depressing than Robert Fischer’s tragic china-doll eyes and father issues?’ asks Eames, eyebrow raised.

‘No, I mean _this,’_ she says, gesturing at a photo of their mark, a middle-aged millionairess with honey-blonde hair and an astonished-looking facelift.

‘Really?’ wonders Arthur. ‘Practically every multi-millionaire in the world cheats on their spouse at some point. I'd be more surprised if she _hadn't_.' Humans are an opportunistic species, and there are a lot of opportunities for infidelity open to you when you’ve got your own private jet.

‘OK, _that’s_ depressing as well,’ says Ariadne, scowling at him like he’s just stated an opinion rather than a fact. ‘Although I don’t know why she doesn’t just marry the other guy. I mean, she’s been sleeping with him longer than her actual _husband.’_

‘Familiarity is the enemy of romance,’ says Eames sagely. ‘I like to theorise that that’s why Arthur always keeps me at arm’s length.’

‘Actually, I was talking about her face,’ says Ariadne, and swivels the laptop around to display a picture of the mark following her most recent bout of cosmetic surgery, face bruised and bloated. ‘I mean, seriously? Who does that to themselves?’

‘Rich people,’ says Arthur.

‘People who want to stay beautiful forever,’ says Eames.

‘It’s just sad. You don’t see many _guys_ trying to look like 25-year-old aliens when they’re old enough to be grandparents. She’s got so much botox in there she can’t even move. She looks like reality television.’

‘Maybe she wants to look like that,’ suggests Eames. ‘Personal body image is a wonderful thing.’

Arthur says nothing. There is no doubt in his mind that he’s had more surgery than Eames and Ariadne combined.

‘Would _you_ want to date a woman who’d spent thousands of dollars to look like that?’

‘It hardly matters what I think, does it?’ says Eames lightly. ‘It’s not my face. And besides,’ he adds, winking at Arthur. ‘I think we all know where _my_ interests lie.’

*       *       *

  
They take Ariadne out to celebrate afterwards. Or possibly it’s the other way round. With Ariadne there to act as a buffer between them, Eames is nowhere near as annoying as usual. She keeps buying them drinks, and when a guy wanders over to them at the bar and asks her what they’re celebrating, Ariadne says, ‘My divorce papers coming through,’ without batting an eyelash.

The guy looks surprised, as well he might. Ariadne may be twenty-three years old, but she looks practically underage and doesn’t usually bother with makeup, as far as Arthur can tell.

‘That’s my little con-woman,’ laughs Eames, and stretches an arm along the back of the seat behind Arthur’s shoulders.

‘Don’t think I didn’t notice what you just did there,’ says Arthur, glaring, but he doesn’t attempt to move Eames’ arm. It’d only migrate back again, anyway.

As the night wears on, it gets harder and harder to remember _why_ he shouldn’t be letting Eames have his arm round his shoulders, playing with the hair at the nape of Arthur’s neck. Eames doesn’t seem to change much when he’s drunk, except he feels warmer. Unless that’s just because Arthur’s sitting closer to him than usual.

He tries to pay attention to the conversation, but he figures it’s not that important. Ariadne’s been trying to get him to relax all evening, anyway, and it’s very easy to do that when Eames’ hands are combing through his hair like that. Arthur shivers. Ariadne looks very pretty in the half-light of the bar, pretty in that way some women are without really having to try. That’s probably why she didn’t understand the mark so well, earlier. Perhaps she would’ve understood better if she’d been born with enormous ears or something.

She’s got nice ears.

‘Plastic surgery isn’t so bad,’ Arthur tells her solemnly.

‘I’m... sorry?’

‘I think he’s continuing our conversation from this morning, love,’ says Eames, sounding amused. ‘Arthur, I have waited far, far too long to see you drunk. It’s even more delightful than I expected.’

Arthur opens his mouth to say he’s not that drunk. Then he considers it, and closes his mouth again.

He suspects that Eames is laughing at him.

‘I didn’t say it was _bad_ , Arthur,’ says Ariadne.

Eames taps him on the nose. ‘Why, have you had work done? _Splendid_ work, if that is indeed the case,’ he adds.

‘I was born with this face!’ says Arthur, offended, then adds with careful accuracy: ‘Well, I didn’t used to be able to grow facial hair, of course.’

‘Few can, when they’re babies,’ says Eames.

Arthur reaches round and runs a finger down Eames’ jaw and along the soft skin beneath his chin, then realises what he’s doing. ‘Uh, sorry,’ he says, rocketing back in his seat.

‘Don’t apologise, sweetheart,’ purrs Eames, and Arthur remembers all over again why Eames is a douchebag. The pet names. Arthur _really hates_ the pet names.

Also, Ariadne is laughing at him.

 **7.**  
The problem with telling Eames is that it will go one of two ways. Either he’ll be surprised, or he won’t be. If it’s the former then Arthur doubts that it’ll be a _pleasant_ surprise, no matter how open-minded an individual Eames may be. And if he’s _not_ surprised, then Arthur’s failed.

If he can fool Eames, then he can fool anyone.

 **8.**  
They’re going so fast that Arthur can feel the pressure of the G-force against the skin of his face and neck, making his breath just that little bit tighter than is natural. He’s already made the decision that even though the job’s over and the extraction’s been made, he’s not going to calmly await the kick like a good boy. He’s going to drive this fucker over a cliff. If he can’t find a cliff, he’s going to _make_ one. It is going to be the best death of his entire life: flying through the air in a Lamborghini Reventón (serial number: unmarked, because Arthur’s subconscious is nothing if not meticulously precise, and imaginary cars don’t get serial numbers because he knows who owns every single one of the twenty-one Reventóns that exist in real life) at several hundred kilometres per hour. The fact that Eames is in the seat beside him is a near-inconsequential detail.

This car. _This car._ He really wants a go in one in real life to see if it’s this fucking awesome. It’s probably better. There’s no way Arthur’s limited imagination skills can live up to the no-doubt godlike attributes of the real thing.

‘Where are we going?’ shouts Eames, laughing. He’s reverted back to his own face, but is still wearing the boring grey suit and yellow power-tie of the man he’d been forging for the extraction.

‘No idea,’ Arthur replies, voice hoarse with the thrill of speed, or maybe just the pressure of the G-force on his throat.

He swerves to make the narrow gap between two cars on the road up ahead. The Lamborghini handles like it’s part of his own body -- better, even.

‘Fucking hell,’ says Eames faintly, sounding honest-to-god _unnerved_ , and Arthur has to turn to see his expression for just a moment, his own face hurting from grinning so hard. Eames is watching him openly, sitting half-sideways in his seat with the seatbelt riding up against his neck.

‘What do you think?’ asks Arthur, teasing, and thinks briefly that for once, their roles have been reversed.

‘I think we’ve got twenty minutes before the kick,’ says Eames. ‘Pull over.’

‘No way,’ says Arthur, accelerating slightly just because he can. It’s difficult to focus on anything other than the road directly ahead, they’re moving so fast. ‘I fully intend to _die_ in this car.’

‘If it makes you look like this in real life,’ says Eames fervently. ‘I will _buy_ you this fucking car. Now, pull over. You can always come back and play with it later.’

Eames makes a good point. But it’s a wrench to stop driving this beautiful, beautiful artwork of a machine. Rather than pulling over sensibly at the side of the road, he waits till they get to an interchange (thankfully deserted) and makes use of the extra space to skid, showy and sloppy like all sorts of Hollywood stunt idiocy, across the asphalt. This isn’t reality; Arthur doesn’t have to care about ruining the tires.

Arthur undoes his seatbelt at once, breath coming fast, and strokes a hand down the LCD display on the dashboard. What with the double-whammy of a job _very_ well done and _this car_ , he feels practically post-coital. ‘Who was it who said I never had any fun?’ he asks, punchy. ‘Oh, right: _you_.’

‘Arthur,’ says Eames, sounding very serious as he clicks open his seatbelt and lets it whir away behind him. ‘If you have any objections to me kissing you, I suggest you voice them now.’ He has a hand placed firmly on the no-man’s-land of the blank plate between the driver and passenger seats, where in a real-life Reventón the serial number would be printed.

‘Bring it,’ says Arthur idiotically. Right now he’s in the spirit of allowing himself to have things he wants, for once.

Eames catches a hand in Arthur’s shirt front and pulls him forward, using Arthur’s forward momentum to make him pretty much fall into Eames’ lap. Arthur bangs his elbow on the steering wheel on his way over, which is pretty fucking painful, but he doesn’t get enough time to pay attention to it because Eames’ lips are on his, hot and slick. There’s no way to get two adult men into a sensible position in the cramped space of a two-seater sport car so Arthur doesn’t even bother. He just shoves Eames around, trying not to let go too much, until he’s able to straddle him without getting too much of a crick in his neck from the low ceiling. Eames’ stubble, sharp against his mouth, is everything he’s hoped for. When Eames’ hands slide down to cup his ass, Arthur can feel him smile for a moment, wide and happy.

‘You can’t buy me this car,’ says Arthur, pulling back for a moment to unbutton Eames’ collar. ‘There’re only twenty-one in the world, and you’re not that rich.’

‘I’m a thief, darling. Are you doubting my abilities?’ He’s flushed, hair utterly destroyed from the rather unfortunate side-parting he’s been favouring recently. Arthur gets a handful and tugs on it, pulling Eames’ head back. Eames looks him straight in the eye, his smile a lazy curve as he goes totally pliant under Arthur’s hands. ‘That’s right. I knew you’d be like this. You love it, don’t you, you controlling bastard,’ he says fondly, rolling his hips, and Arthur bites into his mouth, managing to knock his head against the roof of the car despite himself.

‘Oh my god, stop _talking_ ,’ Arthur says, half-laughing into his mouth as he scrabbles for a grip on the back of Eames’ seat to stop from falling over. He bends down to suck a kiss into the fresh skin on the side of Eames' neck, just where the stubble ends.

‘Yeah, you can hold me down if you like,’ Eames continues, ignoring him, squirming as Arthur catches one of his hands and clamps it down against the gearshift so it won’t get in the way. ‘Somewhere with a bit more space than here next time, right? Can’t wait for you to fuck me properly,’ he whispers filthily, and Arthur is quite frankly astonished at how much enthusiasm Eames can inject into his voice when his mouth is half squashed against Arthur’s ear and they’re both only a few inches away in each direction from braining themselves on some part of the car’s interior. ‘I like being spread open, just for future reference,’ he adds, and looks incredibly smug when Arthur pulls back, eyes wide.

Arthur’s chest has gone tight at the image and he’s halfway to pulling Eames’ shirt open right there when he realises what Eames must be picturing. Then, rather than just appreciating the heat of Eames’ erection digging into his thigh, his brain finally catches up and he understands what it means. Arthur’s got a dick in today’s dream (he has no idea why -- maybe it’s the car, but that seems kind of worryingly stereotypical) but he’s never fucked anyone with it, and even if he tried right now, who the hell knows whether it would work or not? In dreams when he’s 100% male, he’s still the same person, and that person has never experienced having a cock in real life. He doesn’t have the right source material to work from. And if Eames tries to do this later (which he _really, really will_ , and at least Arthur is able to admit that he’s aware of this) he’s going to get a weird -- if not nasty -- surprise. And _now Arthur’s started overthinking it_.

‘Problem?’ asks Eames, still using that warm, molasses-slow voice, stroking a hand up Arthur's back. Arthur flinches away.

‘This isn’t real,’ he says. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘I’m fairly certain I’m not a projection, if that’s what you mean,’ says Eames. ‘And if I am, where’s the harm?’

‘We shouldn’t be doing this,’ says Arthur, and wriggles away to open the car door. He’s most of the the way towards making an escape when the world lurches away and they’re waking up from the kick. He blinks his eyes and the motel ceiling comes into focus above him, his arm aching a little at the injection site.

Beside him on the bed, the mark sandwiched between them with the PASIV case at his feet, Eames is sitting up as well. ‘Mind telling me what that was about?’ he says.

Arthur feels himself blush angrily. He has zero desire to explain himself right now. ‘Do you demand explanations from everyone who doesn’t want to have sex with you? Or just me?’

‘Five minutes ago you _did_ want to have sex with me. And don’t try telling me you’ve got some kind of Lamborghini fetish that explains the whole thing away, because I won’t believe you.’

‘It was a mistake. I’m sorry for... leading you on, or whatever. Can we both act like adults about this? At least till we’re out of this motel?’

‘You’re a fine one to talk. Ten minutes ago you were humping my leg in a million-dollar James Bond sportscar and now you’re yelling at me like you’re a fifteen-year-old girl and I just tried to defile you.'

Oh, was _that_ the wrong thing to say.

Arthur’s hands clench into fists. Even when he _had_ been --or at least looked like -- a fifteen-year-old girl, he wouldn’t have _yelled_ about anything. He would’ve punched Eames in the fucking nuts. Which is what Arthur wants to do right now.

‘We work together. You’re a thief. You’re untrustworthy. You smoke. I don’t even know your real name. You think everything’s a game. I don’t want my life to be any more complicated than it already is,’ Arthur reels off, packing away the PASIV case as fast as he can and checking the pulse of the mark, still out cold on the bed. ‘There’s a couple of good reasons for you. Take your pick.’

‘Bollocks. I think you’ve got some horribly American sexual hangup and you don’t want to tell me about it because you think I’ll laugh,' he says, words coming fast. 'What is it, guns? That seems like you. Something dangerous. Or maybe you want to see me done up as a nice little blonde, how about that? I’ve done that before, that’d be no problem at all. But you’re obsessed with things being _real_ , so it’s probably not that one. I know. You’re a virgin, aren’t you?’ He sounds like he's plucking insults out of thin air, inflamed enough that he looks ready to throttle Arthur with his own necktie. To Arthur, who’s never seen him exhibit anything more intense than mildly amused irritation, it’s somewhere between terrifying and pathetic to witness. Pathetic, because Eames is getting this worked up over the fact that he’s not getting laid today.

‘I’m not a virgin,’ Arthur spits. ‘I’m thirty years old.’

‘Well, why don’t you tell me what you want, then? Because Arthur, _I will do it_.’

‘I don’t need you to do anything except _leave it alone_ ,’ he says. ‘Nothing’s going to happen. Get over it.’

‘Oh, certainly,’ he says, knife-sharp with sarcasm. ‘I’ll do that. I’m sure it’ll be easy. After all, it’s not like I’ve been been following you around like a bloody _dog_ for years --’

‘Oh, SHUT THE FUCK UP,’ Arther shouts, and only realises how embarrassingly loud he’s being when the mark stirs in his sleep and they both freeze. Arthur realises that they are having an actual real-life domestic argument in a cheap motel room like some kind of soap opera. This is the opposite of what his life should be right now. ‘Stop being such a melodramatic asshole about this,’ he hisses. Eames, standing on the other side of the bed, is breathing hard like they're fighting with fists, not words. ‘No one’s been following anyone around. I’ve only seen you three times in the last _year_ , and one of those times you were pretending to be in the mafia and only spoke Russian. We’re not _friends,_ Eames,’ he says viciously, and dear god, he doesn’t even know what he’s _saying_ now -- ‘You’re the guy who makes comments about my suits because you think it’s hilarious for anyone to act like a professional when they’re breaking the law. I’ve known you to sleep with someone for a job at least once. I’m pretty sure you can figure out why this isn’t going to work.’

‘Yeah, is it perhaps because you’re suddenly _psychotic_?’ asks Eames, sweetly, and pulls on his jacket violently like he’s checking the magazine of a gun. ‘I’m so _glad_ we got to have this little chat, Arthur,’ he says, just before he leaves the room and abandons Arthur with the mark and several million dollars worth of stolen military technology. ‘I’m already starting to understand that I’ve rather dodged a bullet with this one, wouldn’t you agree?’ 

**9.**  
The next time he sees Eames, he’s spends all their time together descending almost into self-parody with his overly-intellectual criticism on Arthur’s plans and mocking comments about Arthur’s supposed uptightness. Arthur supposes that this is how Eames does professional distance. He has no idea why Eames even agreed to take a job with him after that last fiasco.

After the extraction’s over and he’s cleared out their temporary workshop, Arthur goes to the hotel bar where he knows Eames will be having a celebratory drink with their chemist. Neutral territory.

Eames is sitting on a bar stool with his feet up on the rungs of the chemist’s stool, companionable and chuckling at something she’s saying. He doesn’t notice Arthur at first, and Arthur takes a moment just to look at him, the gap at his neck where his crisp blue shirt is unbuttoned to reveal tanned skin below. The way he holds himself, relaxed and confidant. His unspeakable shoes.

‘You staying for a drink, Arthur?’ asks the chemist, waving her beer bottle at him.

‘No, I’ve got a plane to catch,’ he says. The plane’s not for another six hours. But he will have to catch it _then,_ so it's not entirely a lie. ‘I just thought I’d say goodbye on the way out. That was a smooth job.’

‘Well done, us?’ suggests Eames mockingly, and takes a swig from his pint.

Arthur and the chemist shake hands. ‘I’ll be sure to recommend you to my colleagues,’ he says.

She winks. ‘Thanks, mate.’

Eames is holding out his hand as well. Arthur doesn’t actually think they’ve ever shaken hands before. Maybe when they first met? He can’t remember. Eames’ hand is large and warm against his own. And strong enough to lift him up between the two seats of a Lamborghini Reventón, he remembers.

Arthur lets go. ‘I told you you’d get over it,’ he says, quiet enough that the chemist will know it’s none of her business, and keeping it nonspecific enough that she won’t know what they’re talking about.

‘That’s what you told me,’ Eames agrees.

 **10.**  
The humidity hits him like a wall when he first arrives in Ho Chi Minh City. Cobb is from the South and barely seems to feel it and Eames appears to revel in being sweaty and revolting, but Arthur begins to wilt almost immediately, growing irritable and far more easily distracted than usual. His shirt clings to his back and he feels bloated, like rice gently expanding in a steam oven.

It’s Cobb’s first job since he got back to his kids. Arthur’s not sure if he’s surprised or not that Cobb’s going back to work at all. It’s probably the money; he’d nearly cleared himself out on lawyers’ bills by this time last year, and of course his cut from the Fischer job had gone straight to Yusuf.

They’ve been contracted to secure the minds of Vexcor’s R&D department at their headquarters in Ho Chi Minh City. Eames is coming too, not just because he’s the only one of them who can speak Vietnamese but because (not that Arthur would ever admit this) he makes things more interesting. Cobb needs things to go smooth and easy, and Arthur may have many strengths but making things _fun_ isn’t one of them. Arthur won’t let whatever awkwardness there is between him and Eames get in the way of the job this time. And besides, Eames _had_ agreed to work with them. He clearly wasn’t all that pissed at Arthur any more.

‘I’ve got the strangest feeling that you’ve got me on training wheels, here,’ says Cobb, voice heavy with amusement, when they meet at the airport.

Arthur smiles. ‘Since when has Mr Charles needed training wheels?’

‘Is this all part of a rather strained “it’s just like riding a bike” metaphor?' says a voice from behind them.

They both turn. ‘Hello, Eames,’ says Cobb, and Eames slaps him on the shoulder in greeting.

‘I suppose I’ve got you to thank for persuading dear Arthur to invite me along,’ he says.

Cobb smirks. ‘No, Arthur left me blissfully ignorant during the pre-planning stages.’

‘You _want_ me here?’ asks Eames, delighted. _Fake_ -delighted. There’s a look in his eye that’s sharp enough to cut.

‘I wanted someone who can speak Vietnamese,’ corrects Arthur, heading him off before he can get started.

‘But why not call Vien? He actually _is_ Vietnamese.’

‘Vien is hardly as experienced an extractor as any of us,’ says Cobb.

‘Vien,’ says Arthur darkly, ‘is fucking crazy.’

Truer words, it turns out, were never spoken.

*      *      *

As usual, something goes horribly wrong.

‘We need to catch one of them,’ pants Eames, hot on his heels. ‘I at least want to know _why_ we’re running for our lives.’

They round another corner, careening past street vendors and women with big-wheeled shopping carts. Arthur feels half blinded from trying to focus past the blurring neon of the street lights.

‘You sure there’s nothing you failed to mention about your last trip to Vietnam?’ Arthur asks.

‘I was on _holiday_!’

Arthur risks a look behind them. There are still two men after them, and Cobb is starting to lag behind. Evidently family life has not done wonders for his workout regimen.

‘All right,’ says Arthur. ‘Let’s try to head them off.’ His lungs are burning and he’s soaked with mud from the two times he’s fallen down so far. _Street_ mud, the kind that smells of rotting food. These shoes were not designed for running.

One day on the job. _One day_. And then an hour ago, on their way out of the Vexcor R  & D offices, they’d been jumped by these assholes. The most offensive thing is that as much as Arthur wracks his brains, he can’t work out who they might be.

‘There?’ suggests Eames, gesturing to an empty shop-front coming up ahead. Arthur nods, saving his breath.

Eames kicks sharply at the lock on the door and they tumble inside. The shop is long abandoned, and they both look around for something to use as weapons. Arthur comes up with a long-necked glass jar and they position themselves in such a way that they won’t be immediately visible to anyone coming through the front door.

A moment later Cobb barrels in, chest heaving, and Arthur has just enough time to snap, ‘Get down!’ before their two pursuers follow him in. Cobb rolls under a table and Arthur disposes of the first man with a sharp crack to the top of the head. Eames punches the other one in the stomach, slamming him into the counter for good measure.

Eames presses the man’s face against the greasy glass counter and begins talking to him in Vietnamese, his voice low and cruel. Arthur looks away.

‘The others?’ he asks Cobb.

‘We lost them,’ says Cobb, face bright red and shiny with sweat.

There’s a loud thump as Eames knocks the man out. ‘They work for STC,’ he says. STC are Vexcor’s main competitors.

‘Damn,’ says Cobb. ‘How did they find out about our contract with Vexcor?’

They aren’t even working extraction, but Arthur can see why STC might feel threatened by their presence. ‘How did they even find out who we _are_?’ adds Arthur sharply. He takes out his phone and dials the number for Essa Romkin, Vexcor’s CEO and their current employer.

‘Ms Romkin?’ he says, trying to suppress the anger in his voice. ‘We just had a rather nasty surprise in the form of some STC employees. Have you any idea why they might be after us?’

She sighs. ‘We were made aware of this unfortunate situation a few minutes ago, Arthur. I’m afraid that if you and your team are unable to live up to our standards of discretion then we certainly can’t trust you with the minds of our corporate family.’

‘I assure you,’ says Arthur through gritted teeth. ‘If your competitors _have_ found out anything about our role in your company, it wasn’t through any fault of ours. We’ve barely been in the city two days.’

‘Be that as it may, Arthur, I’d prefer to avoid getting into an outright war with our rivals. I’m sure you understand. Tell Mr Charles you may keep your deposit,’ she adds, and hangs up.

‘Well,’ says Arthur, closing his phone. ‘We’ve been fired.’

Eames beings to laugh.

*       *      *

  
They make their way on foot to their hotel. In keeping with the theme of the day, the sky decides to unleash a sudden tropical rainstorm over their heads. Arthur can feel his hair gel running slimily down inside his collar.

He calls Angela. When Cobb needs information, he calls Arthur; when Arthur needs information, he calls Angela.

‘I need the number for whoever does security at STC,’ he says, like it’s not ludicrously difficult information to get hold of.

‘Whoa, dude,’ says Angela. ‘You sound happy.’ There’s the sounds of typing in the background. Angela never goes anywhere without at least one computer. She even made herself a special hard drive that slots into one of the armrests of her wheelchair.

‘Overjoyed. The number?’

‘I’ll text it to you. You in trouble?’

Arthur glances at Cobb, who still looks pretty winded, and Eames, who looks disgustingly cheerful for a man who’s soaked to the skin and just ran a mile through inner-city traffic. ‘I’ll get back to you on that one.’

He’s just about to hang up when Angela says, ‘Hey, hey... wait. I don’t need to look it up. Vien’s heading up security for STC these days, isn’t he?’

What the hell. Arthur doesn’t know what’s going on yet, but he’s got a feeling it’s not good.

‘Thanks.’

‘No prob,’ says Angela. ‘Okay, gotta go, call waiting.’

‘It’s Vien,’ says Arthur once she’s off the line. ‘He’s working for STC.’

‘The plot thickens,’ says Eames sardonically, shaking rain out of his hair like a dog.

Cobb is scrolling through his contacts list already. ‘I’ve got his number,’ he says. It’s a small world, extraction. They all at least know _of_ one another.

‘Put it on speaker.

It pick up after five rings.

‘Chào?’

‘This is Mr Charles. Why are there men trying to kill me?’ Straight and to the point.

Vien laughs. Arthur and Eames exchange a look. It’s a pretty crazy-sounding laugh.

‘You motherfuckers stole my contract!’

‘We didn’t have a contract with STC,’ says Cobb calmly. ‘You must have been misinformed.’

‘With Vexcor! They were about to seal the deal when you showed up, you bastards.’

‘About to?’ Eames butts in. ‘Looks like they were waiting for someone better than you to show up.’

Arthur glares. ‘Now is not the time, Eames.’

‘Vien,’ says Cobb in a placating tone. ‘We were unaware you had any sort of arrangement with Vexcor. I’m sure we can meet up and sort this out.’

‘Bullshit,’ says Vien. ‘And now that STC knows, you won’t get out of this city alive. Did I hear Arthur there? Tell him he’s gonna get skinned alive.’

He hangs up.

‘He doesn’t like you very much, does he?’ asks Cobb mildly.

‘No,’ says Arthur. The feeling is very much mutual.

‘Splendid,’ says Eames, rubbing his hands together. ‘At least one multinational corporation _and_ a psychotic extractor after our blood already. Not bad for one day’s work, eh?’

‘Well,’ says Cobb, the voice of practicality. ‘We can’t go back to the hotel now.’

*      *      *

  
They find rooms in a dilapidated French Colonial house, interior walls stifling and clammy from the broken – or possibly nonexistent – air conditioning.

‘You look like a drowned rat,’ remarks Eames, stripping off his soaked jacket and throwing it on the floor with a splat.

‘Fuck off,’ says Arthur. He’s not in the mood for this right now.

‘We need to create a false trail,’ says Cobb. ‘STC will be watching the airports. We need to make it look like we’ve already left the city so they’ll stop looking for us here. Eames, can you get hold of a couple of clean laptops?’

‘Ah, petty theft,’ says Eames.

‘I’ll make some calls,’ says Arthur. ‘Once we’ve got phones,’ he adds. They’d dumped their own phones before they got here. He turns out his pockets, putting all his cash on the bed. ‘How much do you two have?’

Cobb and Eames empty their pockets as well. Their pooled resources are less than impressive. Such is life in the age of electronic banking.

‘Shall I pick some pockets while I’m at it?’ asks Eames.

‘Do what you like,’ says Arthur, and Eames shoots him a heated look, like he’s just waiting to come up with the perfect rejoinder to that one.

‘I’m going to scout out the area,’ says Cobb, cutting them both off before Eames can start in with the double entendres and Arthur can punch him for them. ‘Meet back here by tonight?’

Eames slaps Arthur on the back, possibly just for the amusingly wet splat it makes. ‘Of course, fearless leader,’ he says, and saunters out of the room, taking Arthur’s hotel key with him.

*       *      *

  
Arthur gets three disposable cell phones, plus cheap shirts for him and Cobb. The first thing he does with his new phone is call Angela on the way back to the hotel.

‘How quickly can you get one of my boxes shipped down here?’

‘I don’t know. Two days, maybe?’ she estimates. ‘Can’t you get your meds on the black market?’

Arthur’s boxes each contain a supply of HRT drugs. Angela has some, and so does his bank, for times like this. He’s only had to use one once before now, but he’s nothing if not prepared. All Angela knows is that the box contains medication that Arthur needs to take regularly. He’s fairly sure she’s never looked inside the box, not that it would matter enormously.

‘Not without learning Vietnamese,’ says Arthur. ‘And I’d rather not bring Eames in on my private medical issues.’

‘Understood,’ she says cheerfully. ‘I’ll courier them over. Text me the address?’

Well, that’s one problem dealt with, at least.

*       *      *

  
With kidnapping as with art theft, the smash-and-grab is an underrated and surprisingly effective strategy. Either they spot you or they don’t.

As it is, Arthur is trying to make sense of the Vietnamese-English instructions on the rail map when he feels a sharp point of pain in the side of his neck. He has just enough time to think, _oh, shit_ , before he loses consciousness.

*       *       *

  
As in all of the worst nightmares, Arthur knows that he is dreaming.

He is sitting in a park, Central Park maybe, watching a little boy play with trucks in the shadow of an enormous, bulbous early 20th century concrete sculpture. Arthur thinks he may have been here a long time. The boy wasn’t here before, he thinks, but he can’t be sure.

There’s a rustling in the trees that Arthur first attributes to the wind, but when he looks around he sees that it is hundreds of cartoonishly huge spiders, skittering down the tree trunks and onto the grass towards the boy and his toy trucks. They aren’t very far away but they seem to be moving too slowly, or else the distance between them and the boy is stretching out and out and out --

Arthur is frozen. He tries to yell out a warning but can’t. He hasn’t been arachnophobic in years, but for some reason it’s come back.

‘Well, this is better than I dared hope.’

Arthur drags his gaze round to see Cobb and Eames standing next to him. Then he looks straight back to the child sitting on the grass, still blissfully unaware of the spiders crawling inexorably closer.

‘Arthur. Arthur!’

‘I’m not deaf, Cobb,’ says Arthur tersely, unable to look away.

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake,’ says Eames, and runs forward, wading through the spiders to stand over the boy, protective. He reaches down to a fire hydrant that wasn’t there a moment ago and uncoils a high-pressure hose, turning it on the onrushing spiders. He turns in a neat circle to wash them all away, water chasing them back to the treeline. The boy doesn’t even look up.

‘Spiders?’ asks Cobb. ‘Really?’

‘I used to be scared of them when I was a kid,’ says Arthur. ‘Apparently, I'm not over it yet.’

‘So, you know you’re dreaming?’

‘Obviously. You don’t get spiders that size in real life. And I don’t even know where I am.’

‘What’s stopping you from waking up?’ asks Eames.

‘I haven’t woken up yet.’

Eames and Cobb exchange a look. ‘We know that, Arthur. Do you remember how you got here?’

‘Of course not. I’m _dreaming_.’

‘He means how you _got_ here,’ says Eames. ‘Nasty men? Bad drugs? Ring any bells?’

‘Is that why everything’s so weird down here?’ He frowns. ‘I tried to leave, I think.’

There’s an unusual expression on Eames’ face. It might well be concern. ‘You can leave whenever you choose, Arthur.’

‘I’ll leave when I wake up,’ says Arthur. ‘That’s how nightmares work.’ A woman has joined the boy on the grass. She’s taking his toys away and putting them in a box. ‘I’ve only been here a few minutes. I guess I’ll just have to wait it out.’

The woman looks very familiar. A little like his mother, but sharper, and with darker hair.

‘Arthur, you’ve been here longer than that.’ Cobb reaches into his jacket and pulls out a gun. ‘You remember how to wake up, don’t you? You have to kill yourself in the dream.’

‘Jesus Christ, Dom. I’m not going to kill myself,’ he says, thinking of Mal and feeling a sudden swoop of grief in his throat. He’s pretty certain now that Eames and Cobb are projections. He can’t wait to wake up and for this to be over.

Out on the grass, the boy has begun to cry about losing his toys. The woman smacks him on the knee. ‘Stop _whining_ ,’ she says.

Eames follows his gaze. ‘Is that you?’ he asks softly, looking at the little boy.

‘No,’ says Arthur scornfully. ‘He’s like, six years old.’

‘Bloody hell,’ says Eames. ‘They’ve got you completely tranq’d, haven’t they?’

‘Eames, stop poking around in his subconscious, it’s none of your business.’

‘It’s my business if you want me to find him a way out of here. That’s why you brought me, isn’t it?’

‘So, what, you think that’s Arthur and his mother or something? It might not even be literal.’

‘Arthur’s the most literal-minded man in the world.’ He takes a few steps across the grass, friendly smile in place. He holds out his hand to the woman. ‘Hello. Who’s this young man?’ he asks cheerfully, smiling down at the boy.

‘Arthur,’ she says.

Eames shoots a triumphant look back at Cobb. ‘What a coincidence. My friend over there’s named Arthur as well. Lovely name. Are you his mum?’

‘I’m Arthur,’ she says.

Eames glances back at them, puzzled. ‘Possibly not literal after all,’ he calls out.

‘I’d like that gun now, please,’ interrupts Arthur. Cobb is staring between him and the woman on the grass, a little wide-eyed.

Cobb hands it to him. ‘Is that -- ?’ he begins, and then can’t seem to think of a suitable way to voice the question.

‘I’d like you to leave, now, please,’ says Arthur crisply, and shoots him in the head. He falls, body dissipating like vapour before it fully hits the ground.

‘Fuck!’ shouts Eames. Then: ‘Why kill him? I’m the one trying to screw around with your drugged-up little psyche.’

The woman is dragging the boy to his feet. He’s struggling. Arthur feels like he’s going to throw up, the world swimming in front of his eyes. ‘I won’t kill myself,’ he repeats.

Across the park, the sculpture is beginning to shift and move, concrete grinding on concrete. It looks like one of Ariadne’s architectural tricks, back when she was still experimenting with things. It’s filling out into the figure of a woman, naked and pregnant-looking, long hair falling around a plump face. Oh, god. Eames is always so right about everything: Arthur _does_ have the most literal subconscious in the world.

‘So what’s _that_?’ asks Eames as the sculpture gets to her feet like King Kong, lumbering. ‘A childhood phobia of the Venus of Willendorff?’

Arthur laughs. His head is killing him. Down here that’s just a faux-physical manifestation of something else going wrong, but he can’t concentrate enough to work out what. ‘No, it’s probably me as well,’ he says.

‘What?’

‘It’s _all_ me, Eames. It’s my subconscious, after all.’

Eames stares. ‘Fuck what Cobb says, we’re getting out of here.’

He raises another gun from nowhere, and --

\-- Arthur jerks awake and is promptly sick all down his front.

‘Hey, hey,’ Dom is saying, trying to unhook him from the PASIV without Arthur ripping the needle out of his own arm first. ‘It’s OK.’

Arthur fumbles for his totem, the scent of vomit sharp in his nostrils. ‘What -- ?’ he mumbles.

They’re on the floor of a hotel room, Arthur propped up against the bed. In the middle of the carpet are two men, one of whom Arthur recognises as Vien. They’re both out cold, bound together with zip-ties. Vien has blood dripping sluggishly from his hairline down to his chin. Arthur feels concussed, unable to focus his eyes properly on anything. He’s in Ho Chi Minh City, he remembers. Vexcor. Rain. He’d been kidnapped right off the street. _Fuck_.

‘Come on. We need to get you cleaned up,’ says Cobb in a comforting voice that Arthur imagines he uses when one of his children has fallen down and needs a band-aid. Arthur needs a fucking band-aid right now. A band-aid on his _brain_.

‘What did they drug me with, d’you know?’ asks Arthur, hoping that new information will cut through the muzzy smog of his thought-processes.

Eames, lying on the bed, opens his eyes and shifts out of the dream. The PASIV goes silent, it’s last user now disconnected.

‘An extra sedative on top of the Somnacin. And some kind of hallucinogenic, for the nightmares. I don’t think they were trying to extract anything yet. They weren’t under when we got here. I’ll send a sample off for analysis. Do you want to go to a hospital?’

‘Of course he’s going to a bloody hospital,’ says Eames sharply, carelessly throwing IV tubing into Vien’s PASIV case and snapping it shut.

Arthur takes stock of his body, ignoring him. ‘No, I’m not,’ he says.

‘OK,’ says Cobb. ‘Here, drink this.’

Arthur gulps down some water, rinsing his mouth out and spitting it out onto the carpet.

‘How is he?’ asks Eames, getting up off the bed.

‘I’ll be fine,’ says Arthur. ‘I need a change of clothes.’

‘Sounds like Arthur, all right,’ says Eames. ‘Do you remember anyone else from when they took you? It was just these two when we showed up.’ He nudges Vien with the toe of his shoe, none too gently. ‘Do you want a gun?’ He sounds like he wants Arthur to say yes.

Cobb glares. ‘We can’t just kill them. We have to get out of here, and I’d prefer not to do that as part of a high speed chase. There’s enough people after us already, and I quite like to be home on time.’

Arthur thinks that Eames has a far more realistic hold on what Arthur himself would like to do just now. But what he _wants_ to do isn’t the same as what’s practical, unfortunately. ‘Too much trouble getting rid of the bodies,’ says Arthur, and seals his mouth against another lurch of nausea. He pulls himself to his feet, hands shaky on the edge of the bed.

‘I’ll get you some clothes,’ says Eames, shrugging on his coat to go out. ‘I don’t fancy lugging you around town when you smell like that.’

‘Thanks,’ says Arthur sarcastically, and staggers over to the bathroom, dumping his disgusting jacket on the floor. His reflection in the mirror is grey-faced and glassy-eyed as he unbuttons his vomit-covered shirt and throws it down as well. He can still feel the shaky edges of panic left over from his half-forgotten nightmare.

It’s not the greatest of hotels, but they’ve got a bowl of those chewable tooth-cleaning balls on the counter and Arthur rinses his mouth out again and chews one, leaning against the sink. He’s shivering feverishly, blood buzzing uncomfortably in his extremities. He doesn’t know he’s leaning over until he falls down, just avoiding hitting his head off the side of the sink. Cobb rushes in, face seemingly enormous above him as he leans over and checks Arthur’s pupils.

‘Are you sure you don’t want a hospital?’ he says, helping Arthur into a sitting position.

‘Just want a shower,’ says Arthur, mangling the words, and spits out the chewable toothbrush into his hand, lobbing it over his head into the sink. ‘’M disgusting.’

‘Fine,’ says Cobb.

‘Am I cold?’

Cobb feels his forehead. ‘I don’t think you’ve got a fever. Your hands are freezing, though. It’s probably shock. You want me to stay?’

Arthur stands up again, swaying, and fumbles with the buttons on his pants. ‘Put on the shower for me,’ he orders, breathing through his nose.

In the end, Arthur has to sit on the edge of the bath while Cobb unties his shoes for him. Then Arthur strips down to his briefs and steps into the shower, which is quickly filling the room up with steam. Arthur likes his showers very, very hot. Somehow, Dom knows this. He decides that he doesn’t give a shit that Dom’s now seen him pretty much naked. Dom seeing his weird, too-narrow body is nowhere near as bad as the year Arthur had spent scraping Dom off floors and dragging him out of his grief and back into humanity.

His hair gel melts in the hot water and stings his eyes as it drips down his face. Eventually he stops shivering. Whenever he looks up to check, Cobb is a reassuringly solid shape sitting on the toilet seat on the other side of the bathroom, an unfocused blur just about visible through the frosted glass of the shower stall. Arthur just stands there moving as little as possible until he feels sufficiently human, and then steps out, dripping, to where Dom has collected the entire hotel suite’s towels. Arthur stands on a towel with a towel over his head, a towel round his waist, and a towel round his shoulders. He probably looks like an absolute moron, but his mind is starting to clear enough that he’s able to theorise that Dom is feeling pretty fucking guilty right now. It’s Arthur’s job to take care of Dom, not the other way round, but Dom is an absolute champion when it comes to guilt.

‘How did they find me?’ asks Arthur, sitting down on the edge of the bath to drip-dry because he can’t be bothered to move enough to towel himself down. He still feels sluggish, a very different sensation to the typically clean unconscious-conscious changeover of a post-Somnacin wake-up.

‘Smash and grab,’ says Dom. ‘They must have been following you. Don’t you remember?’

‘Kind of,’ he shrugs. ‘I feel like someone ran over my head, but I’m not sure if that’s the drugs or not.’

‘Well, the good news is that while you were busy getting kidnapped and drugged, I got hold of a plane to get us out of here. Just try not to die before 10pm tomorrow, OK?’

‘I’ll make the effort,’ says Arthur drily.

There’s a sound from outside the suite and they both tense up, Cobb quicker than Arthur for once. It’s Eames, locking the door behind him and knocking on the half-open bathroom door before coming in. He’s got a shopping bag in one hand, presumably full of Arthur’s new clothes.

Dispassionately, Arthur catalogues the scene as it must appear to Eames, standing in the doorway. The sad, damp lump of Arthur’s soiled clothes on the bathroom floor. Arthur sitting hunched on the edge of the bathtub with Cobb rubbing a hand between his shoulder blades over the towel like Arthur’s one of his kids. The towel around Arthur’s neck hanging open to expose the mastectomy scars on his chest, faint and faded but still there to reveal all of Arthur’s secrets at last. Shock blossoms in Eames’ expression as he puts two and two together, and Arthur wonders what, exactly, Eames is thinking at this moment. Not just run-of-the-mill surprise as there would be from anyone else knowledgeable enough to understand what those scars mean. Eames is so entirely unused to being wrong about someone, especially a person he knows as well as Arthur -- a person he _thinks_ he knows as well as Arthur -- that this must be a real kick in the teeth for him.

Cobb clears his throat.

‘I got your clothes,’ says Eames at last, hanging the bag on the back of the bathroom door. ‘There’s a car waiting round the back.’

Arthur shrugs off Cobb’s hand. ‘Give me a minute,’ he says and takes the bag of clothes from the hook on the door, steering clear of Eames’ personal space. ‘I’ll be ready to go.’

*       *       *

The rain at the other end of their turbulent plane journey is just as wet as in Vietnam, but ten times as depressing.

‘So that was why?’ asks Eames.

Arthur doesn’t bother asking what he’s talking about. There are not many other awkward questions Eames is likely to spring on him while they’re walking along the dismal grey landing strip away from Cobb’s tiny hired plane, and Arthur’s been expecting this one. He’s surprised that Eames is being enough of a gentleman to ask it now as opposed to yesterday, when Arthur hadn’t had such an easy escape route.

‘What, you think there’s more? I suppose you’re kicking yourself for not working it out earlier.’

‘I never “worked it out” at all,’ says Eames, self-deprecating. ‘I never doubted your ability to keep a secret. You’re nothing if not a sneaky little bastard, Arthur.’

‘Thank you,’ says Arthur, and relaxes a little.

‘I won’t tell anyone,’ says Eames. ‘I know you like to be private.’

Arthur looks ahead to where Cobb is paying a man at the end of the landing strip, handing over wads of cash. ‘Of course you won’t,’ says Arthur, sure of him for once. ‘Who would you tell?’

 **11.**  
It takes three days for Arthur to be sure all the loose ends are tied up following the unmitigated disaster that was the Vexcor contract. Cobb goes back to his kids and Arthur wires Angela the money she’s owed, plus a bunch of flowers.

He’s still tense when he gets home so he gets down Mal’s recipe book from its shelf in the kitchen. It’s an ordinary recipe book, but Mal coded the recipes in order of difficulty when she gave it to him for his twenty-sixth birthday. The rating system goes from one to six stars, six being the most difficult. This is because Arthur approaches cookery the same way another person might approach the New York Times cryptic crossword. It’s the ultimate way to banish the feeling of paranoia and restlessness that coming out of a dream often provokes, as not only does cooking require all his attention, he is also incredibly bad at it. Arthur has no idea how a simple (or not-so-simple) recipe always manages to defeat him, but to this day he’s only managed to achieve victory over dishes marked with one or two stars in Mal’s recipe book.

He settles on a three-star recipe, trying to take his mind off the expression on Eames’ face as he stood in the doorway of that shitty Vietnamese hotel bathroom. This thing between himself and Eames, whatever it might have been in the past, never properly got off the ground in the first place. It’s stupid to get cut up about it now.

The deli across the street has everything he needs apart from sesame oil, but he figures he can just replace that with butter and it won’t make much of a difference.

He begins by laying out every ingredient in front of him like he does with the component parts of a gun when he’s disassembling it for cleaning. They are arranged in the order Mal’s recipe book says they should be added to the various pans and casserole dishes. This _should_ work _._ Sadly, that is what he thinks every time.

Half an hour later, he’s concentrating so hard on salvaging the burning carrots that he only hears the doorbell the second time it rings. Hurriedly, he wipes his hands on his t-shirt and goes to answer it.

‘Hello,’ says Eames.

He’s wearing travel clothes: scuffed jeans, a wrinkled linen shirt and a brown leather jacket. Considering the fact that Arthur himself only got back on American soil a couple of days ago, he’s going to assume that Eames isn’t here on business.

Arthur doesn’t say, “This is unexpected,” because they both know it is already. He doesn’t ask why Eames is here because he doubts that it’s a question that can be answered in a standing-in-the-doorway type of conversation. Instead he just goes back to the kitchen, leaving the door open for Eames if he wants to follow.

Arthur goes back to the hobs to poke hopelessly at the two pans of supposedly-sauteed vegetables and turn over the lamb.

‘You can’t cook,’ observes Eames. ‘At all.’

‘I know.’

‘What do the asterisks on the recipe mean?’

‘Three stars out of six for difficulty,’ says Arthur, refusing to be embarrassed.

‘This one only has fourteen ingredients. Including pepper and thyme.’ He glances over at Arthur, taking the spatula out of his hands. ‘Well, you are full of surprises this week, aren’t you?’ he says lightly.

‘It’s not actually a secret that I can’t cook,’ says Arthur. ‘Can you make this into food or do I dispose of it now?’

Eames casts a doubtful look at Arthur’s dinner. ‘You’re asking me? I suppose you could put it in a blender and make soup.’

‘I broke my blender,’ says Arthur. ‘Are you here to insult my cooking, or was there another reason for this visit?’

‘Maybe. I’ve been thinking of you.’

‘You’ve been thinking about me, or you’ve been trying to analyse me?’

‘A bit of both,’ says Eames. He sticks a finger in the pan of cooling sauce and licks it, making a face. ‘As always. You’re an interesting individual. I can’t seem to help myself.’

‘And more interesting now, I suppose?’ he asks sharply.

‘I haven’t decided yet. How long has Cobb known?’

‘I told him when we started working together. And Mal knew, of course.’

He nods. ‘You were close. Although I’d always wondered why you were her birth partner for James. Your ability to handle a Beretta like you’re playing a musical instrument notwithstanding, you wouldn’t have been my first choice for a tender moment of familial love and viscera.’

‘Mal picked me because Dom’s a pathetic sack of shit who fainted two minutes into the birth of their first child,’ snaps Arthur. ‘Not because she knew I had a vagina.’

Eames holds up his hands, placating. ‘My apologies.’He watches as Arthur begins to clean up the various utensils, dumping leftover food in the trash. The way he watches Arthur hasn’t really changed since they first met. Maybe Eames is a little more wary, now. ‘Why do you think I’m a forger?’

‘If you say something like, it’s because you’re able to understand the inner workings of the female mind, I’m going to kick you out,’ says Arthur. He doesn’t need Eames making some kind of attempt at _empathy_.

‘God, no. It’s because I don’t really understand the workings of my _own_ mind, Arthur. I go under all the time, you know. Just so I can be other people. I’ve spent at least a month out of every one of the last eight years pretending to be someone else. How do you think I know Yusuf? Sometimes I go under for days, with the dreamers in his basement. I know Cobb told you about them. He calls them the junkies.’

‘Is this supposed to make me think you’re like me? Eames, that’s a _vacation_ you’re talking about. Don’t you think I wish I could do that?’ He takes a deep breath, making an effort not to get mad again. ‘You want to know why I freaked out in the car? Because in that dream I had a dick and I had no idea what to do with it. So don’t try to fucking sympathise with me, OK?’

Eames is frowning, the typical relaxation gone from his posture. ‘That’s not what I mean,’ he says. ‘We’re nothing alike, that’s one of the things I _like_ about you. I’m trying to say I might have a slight understanding of your situation. I’m not going to run screaming because you’re a different person from who you were when you were sixteen, Arthur.’

‘That’s an interesting way of putting it,’ he says neutrally.

‘An accurate one,’ says Eames. ‘We steal dreams for a living, Arthur. Compared to some things I’ve found out about my friends, is this really such an insurmountable problem?’

There’s a long pause.

‘Are you saying,’ says Arthur at last. ‘That you still want into my pants?’

Eames stares at him. Then he starts to laugh, leaning against the kitchen counter and laughing and laughing until crows-feet appear at the corners of his eyes. ‘Oh -- god. Arthur, never fucking change, all right?’

‘I already did that once,’ says Arthur drily. ‘I’m unlikely to do it again.’

Eames takes a brief break from laughing to gape at Arthur in shock. Then he starts chuckling again, hand over his face. He looks utterly ridiculous. Arthur can feel hope blooming in his chest, embarrassing and warm. ‘Look, Arthur, when you gave me that long list of horseshit reasons why you’d never touch me if I was on the last man on earth... how many were you serious about?’

‘Are you offering to steal me a Lamborghini?’ asks Arthur.

‘Are you going to start screaming at me like a deranged person again if I try to kiss you?’ he counters.

‘Try it,’ says Arthur. ‘And find out.’

 **12.**  
The sun is Mombasa’s, the buildings are Arthur’s, but the crowd is pure Eames. Loud and lively, they’re watching a cockfight, the birds fighting tiredly in the dust at the centre of a ragged ring of spectators. Arthur is seated in a rooftop cafe overlooking the fight, close enough that he can tell what’s going on but far enough away that the noise isn’t grating. Up here he can just about smell a sea breeze in the air.

‘Barbaric, isn’t it?’

Arthur looks up to see a tall, slim South Asian gentleman standing beside his chair. He looks around fifty, and has a newspaper tucked under one white-sleeved arm.

‘It could be worse,’ says Arthur. ‘It could be humans fighting out there.’

‘Thankfully not,’ says the man. ‘The tea here’s good, but not good enough for me tolerate gladiatorial combat next door. May I?’

‘Be my guest,’ says Arthur, waving to the seat beside him. He’d never in a million years strike up this kind of conversation with a stranger in real life, of course. But this isn’t a stranger, and it isn’t real life.

The man settles down, pulling the chair round the table so he has a view both of Arthur and of the street below. ‘Tausiq,’ he says, holding his hand out. His fingers are long and dry as they shake hands.

‘You can call me Arthur,’ he replies. ‘What brings you to... here?’ Arthur isn’t certain where they’re supposed to be. Somewhere imaginary but semi-familiar, an interesting amalgam of Arthur’s experiences and Eames’.

‘My sister’s wedding.’

‘Congratulations.’

‘I’ll say so,’ says Tausiq. ‘She’s almost forty. We thought it’d never happen. At this rate -- ‘ He pauses as a server comes round to take their orders.

‘What do you recommend?’ asks Arthur.

‘Mint tea,’ says Tausiq, and Arthur’s surprised because Eames doesn’t even brush with mint toothpaste, never mind drink it. But of course, this isn’t Eames. Could Eames actually change his own sense of taste? Arthur will have to remember to ask him later, once they’re awake and he’s broken character.

‘Sounds good,’ says Arthur, and Tausiq orders for both of them in Hindi, far faster than Arthur’s near-nonexistent grasp of the language can follow. He’s always impressed when Eames’ projections can speak other languages so fluently. The only non-English language Arthur feels comfortable enough using within a dream scenario is French, and after a few hours making certain never to fall back into thinking in English, he’s always exhausted.

The tea arrives almost immediately and Tausiq waits, tapping his finger against the table, as the server to pours it for them. ‘I love the heat,’ he says, downing a mouthful of boiling tea like it’s a shot.

‘I can see that,’ says Arthur, blowing gingerly over his own tea. He’s not getting into a pissing-contest with Eames’ latest forgery over tea, unless that’s what Eames _really_ wants.

‘I moved to England for university,’ he says. ‘You’re American, aren’t you? So I hope you won’t be offended when I say the weather in England is utterly revolting. I have to return home now and then, just for the clear air.’ He waves a hand down towards the street, where money is changing hands over the victor of the cockfight. ‘But of course there’s this kind of thing here. I could never live with it full time.’

Tausiq, Arthur thinks, is kind of a snob. Either that or he’s an animal rights activist, which seems unlikely.

‘It’s good to travel,’ says Arthur neutrally.

‘If you can afford it,’ says Tausiq, tilting his glass in a sardonic salute.

The small size of the glasses and Tausiq’s tyrannical control over the teapot mean the tea is eked out over the remainder of the evening, until the sun is beginning to drop down behind the edges of the rooftops on the hill. Tausiq is a talker, but not in a way that Arthur finds entirely annoying. His clearly-exaggerated anecdotes of various travel misadventures are all the more entertaining because Arthur knows that Eames is probably making them up on the spot to fit in with his perception of Tausiq’s character. They still sound completely convincing. Tausiq doesn’t mention any family, but Arthur thinks he probably has a son -- he treats Arthur as if he’s much younger than he is, far too condescending than is polite when talking to a man of thirty who he’s only just met. Although possibly Arthur’s just looking a little more boyish than usual today, he’s not sure.

When it begins to get truly dark, Tausiq glances at his watch, causing Arthur to mirror the movement unconsciously. Their time is almost up. Arthur smiles to himself. Either Eames had timed the sunset perfectly to match up with their wake-up time -- which would be just like him -- or it’s one of those little unconscious coincidences that always seem to crop up when Eames is the dreamer.

‘It was a pleasure meeting you,’ says Arthur, reaching over to shake Tausiq’s hand as he stands to leave the table.

‘Likewise,’ says Tausiq perfunctorily, clearly already losing interest, and walks off down the stairs and into the crowd. He leaves his newspaper folded neatly on the table. Arthur doesn’t bother trying to read it, but just puts his feet up on the now-vacated chair and tilts his head back to watch the stars come out. The countdown music echoes calmly through the crowd-sounds of the city at dusk, and a moment later he feels the kick.

They’re in bed. Arthur’s PASIV case is open on the bedside table, IV lines trailing round their pillows and down their arms. Eames is wearing the puzzled expression he gets when he’s just coming up out of a forgery and he has the luxury of being in a safe environment. There’s a brief moment during which Tausiq lingers on in Eames’ eyes, the delicate position of his hands folded over his stomach, until Eames shakes it off and he’s himself again.

He makes as if to get up, but Arthur places a hand in the middle of Eames’ chest, pressing him down lightly into the bed. He relaxes back into the pillows while Arthur removes the needle and swabs down his arm.

‘Well, now you’ve seen what I do with my spare time,’ says Eames as Arthur rolls his sleeve down for him.

‘Not as perilous as Cobb makes out,’ Arthur remarks, thinking of the serene faces of the dream-junkies in Yusuf’s basement. Maybe it’s just the comparative comfort of their current setting, but Arthur finds it difficult to believe that Eames recreational forgery habit is as dangerous as all that. Certainly not as dangerous as his love of gambling to lose, anyway.

‘Think you’ll ever use him?’ he asks, removing the PASIV’s battery from its slot and putting it in a carry-case to be charged later.

‘Tausiq? Maybe. You never know.’ Eames stretches his hands over his head, pillowing his head on his arms. He’s clearly not planning on leaving the bed, so Arthur sits down on the mattress beside him, close enough that he can feel the warmth of Eames’ body. ‘Just wanted to play with him, really. Are you suitably impressed?’

Arthur smiles. ‘I _have_ seen you work before,’ he reminds him.

‘Ah, but this wasn’t work. Which is rather the point, isn’t it?’

‘I guess I was expecting something a little flashier,’ Arthur admits.

‘People aren’t flashy, on the whole,’ says Eames thoughtfully. ‘The more ordinary a person is, the harder they are to get to know, as far as I’ve experienced. Tausiq’s an interesting puzzle to solve.’

‘The mint tea,’ says Arthur, remembering. ‘Did you actually like it, then?’

‘ _I_ don’t particularly, no. But Tausiq would.’

‘How can you know that?’ asks Arthur, half-frustrated, half-mystified.

He frowns. ‘I don’t know. He doesn’t like sweet drinks. He likes high temperatures. Maybe I saw him drinking it at some point and forgot. I could be entirely wrong, of course,’ he adds, flipping a hand dismissively.

‘But there was no need to drink it when you were him,’ says Arthur, trying to understand. ‘You could’ve been drinking whiskey and I wouldn’t have been any the wiser.’

Eames looks confused. ‘Yes, but that wouldn’t have been _right_ , darling.’ He wriggles up the bed, propping his head on the pillows to look at Arthur properly. ‘Why the sudden interest? I’d have expected these kind of questions from you when we first started working together, maybe, but not now.’

‘Like you said,’ says Arthur. ‘This isn’t work.’

‘Listen, Arthur. Is this about Tausiq? Or is it about forgery in general? Do you want to know how to do it? Because I warn you, I might not be able to teach you. But you know I’ll try, if you want.’ For Eames, that’s horribly earnest. He’s looking at the ceiling while he says it: he only goes for the full-on truthful eye contact thing when he’s trying to fool a mark.

Arthur considers it. He thinks about being twenty-two years old and awed at Elise’s ability to change shape like something out of a sci-fi movie; remembers being older but not much wiser when he first saw Eames do the same thing. He’d only just finished transitioning when he’d gone under in a dream for the first time; no wonder he’d been all over the place back then. He still got flashes of it, even now. Waking up after a PASIV session feeling ever-so-slightly out of place in his body because because it’s not quite the same shape as it had been in the dream. At the age of sixteen or so, Arthur would have killed for an opportunity like this, for someone offering to show him how to _become_ the person he knows he’s meant to be, even if it’s only for a few hours at a time. But he’s not sixteen now. And if he can’t be satisfied with reality at this point, he never will be.

‘Sometimes,’ he says at last. ‘You’ve got to accept that you can’t teach the unteachable.’

Eames relaxes. ‘I’d make a terrible teacher, anyway,’ he says, and hooks an ankle round Arthur’s arm to tug him over on top of him. Outside, the rain is beating against the old, warped glass of Eames’ apartment window, about as far away from the yellow sun of their recent shared dream as Arthur could imagine. It’s dark out, but they’ve been asleep for a long time already. Neither of them are tired.

‘Got a call from Ariadne this morning,’ says Eames, running his hands up Arthur’s thighs and watching happily as Arthur kneels up, straddling him, to pull his sweater over his head. They’ve been doing this for three weeks now, and there’s only a moment of hesitation this time before Arthur begins to unbutton his shirt as well. ‘She told me to pass along the message that she’s got a job for a man of your talents,’ Eames continues, batting Arthur’s hands away to take care of the final two buttons. ‘Seems you’ve had your phone off for some reason.’ He smirks. ‘Wonder why that is?’ he asks innocently, and runs a hand round the waistband of Arthur’s trousers.

‘Don’t be an asshole.’ Arthur mock-frowns at him, but it’s hard to keep it up when Eames is looking so goddamned pleased with himself. ‘If she calls again, tell her I’m on vacation.’

 _‘Vacation_?’ asks Eames, drawling the word out in a rather inaccurate parody of Arthur’s accent. He spreads his legs to give Arthur better access, sighing as Arthur settles between them. Arthur props himself up on one arm so he can mouth along Eames’ jaw, feeling the muscles in Eames’ face shift and tense as he smiles.

‘On second thought,’ says Arthur, reconsidering. ‘Just let her know I’ll be here.’


End file.
